Iran court jails 4 over US-backed plot

Obama, who takes office on Tuesday, has said he will take a "new approach" toward Iran.

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18 Ocak 2009 Pazar 12:32

Iran's official news agency reports that four Iranians have been convicted and sentenced to prison in an alleged US-backed plot to topple the government.

IRNA says Tehran's Revolutionary Court sentenced the four to jail on charges of trying to overthrow the Islamic government with the alleged support of the U.S. State Department and the CIA.

The judiciary last Tuesday said Iran had arrested four Iranians in connection with a suspected U.S.-financed plot to topple the Islamic system, in an announcement made a week before the inauguration of Barack Obama as U.S. president.

"Based on clear confessions, the accused planned to weaken the foundation of the government and overthrow the Islamic system," Mehr News Agency quoted Tehran's revolutionary court as saying.

Mehr quoted the court statement as saying the accused in the case had been sentenced to imprisonment and were behind bars.

The Bush administration had "hired a number of renegade and traitorous agents," who, with U.S. funding, aimed to "realize their sinister goals," the court said, according to Mehr.

It added: "The accused have explicitly confessed to the plan to present the United States as the only savior of the Iranian people by creating a gap between the people and the government of Iran."

Obama, who takes office on Tuesday, has said he will take a "new approach" toward Iran.